Strange Medicine

by Jim Stein

  Rather than charge, those hooked hands raised high, talons clacking together. The clicking rose, reminding me of an applauding audience. Mr. Easton gave me a questioning look just as the ground behind the shamblers exploded and tumbleweeds burst out onto the surface. They raced toward us, trails of dust rising behind each.

  A shot rang out from above my head, followed by another. Woody chunks flew from the lead creature, but it didn’t even slow. They ignored the ATVs and crashed into the wagon before veering away. The harvester rocked with impacts from both sides. The nearest ball of branches circled wide, giving me a view of flashing teeth and red eyes as it looped back for another hit. Guns blazed but had little effect.

  These rolling dervishes might be dense, but they were still made of wood—and wood burned. The band’s “Bring the Fire” began with explosions from Billy’s synthesizer and bombs dropping off Quinn’s bass. I fed the music Fire magic and launched a dart of flame into an inbound tumbleweed.

  The streak of flame disappeared into the spinning sticks, and the creature slammed into the wagon’s front tire with a resounding boom. I cursed and rubbed my numb fingers as it sped away. My second shot flared out as a fist-sized ball and hit the next one at ground level. It burst into flames and veered wide. Ice crystals formed around me as I coaxed the magic to feed from the sunbaked sand and fired off two more.

  The burning weeds tumbled themselves apart, and whatever was in the core flashed into greasy yellow flames as if made of gasoline. I grinned as what should have been the last careened wildly and exploded. But another roared in from my right, and a second from straight ahead. Manny stepped in front of the vehicles. A tongue of liquid flame swept out from the knife in his hand, damned near vaporizing the weeds as they dove at the cart. Still they came.

  With each exploded attacker, another gout of sand erupted behind the shamblers as they called up a replacement. I didn’t know about Manny, but I was rapidly running out of resources, despite using my surroundings to fuel the spell—the magic could only stretch so far.

  “It’s the shamblers,” I called to Mr. Easton. “Concentrate your fire there.”

  The sporadic gunshots changed to steady sustained fire as the farmers hammered at the stationary sloth creatures. A half dozen high-powered rifles concentrated on the nearest shambler. The creature staggered as it absorbed the punishment and the weed it controlled shot off into the desert as if running for the hills.

  The Eastons walked their way through our attackers as Manny and I continued to destroy tumblers. The clacking of those raised claws intensified, a chattering of bones below the deafening gunfire. Sand exploded up around both groups, and I braced myself for a new round of attacks. Dust and sand swirled higher, wind roaring in two tight circles. The guns fell silent simply because the men and women could no longer sight on their targets.

  As suddenly as it started, the swirling wind ceased, the sand dropped to the ground, and the shamblers were gone.

  “That’s what I’m talking about!” Pete hung out of his small driver’s compartment brandishing his rifle.

  I should have realized my friend wouldn’t be content just driving. Shouts and cheers rose from the others.

  “Everyone sound off,” Mr. Easton boomed.

  It took a minute to account for everyone. Manny looked as tired as I felt. Using so much fire had drained me, but the blazing sun did wonders in keeping the deep chills and hypothermia at bay.

  I turned to ask Manny what form of magic he’d used, because it certainly wasn’t elemental. But the sheer joy of surviving slipped away with my grin. The attack had badly dented the wagon and worse. Ragged rubber strips hung from wheels that wanted to head off in different directions.

  “Okay, enough celebrating,” Pete walked the perimeter of the harvester with his dad, inspecting the damage. “Guards keep watch, and the rest of you clean up this mess.”

  “Yeah, but Pete…” I was no engineer, but could tell we weren’t going anywhere.

  “Cheer up.” Pete gave me a wicked grin—of all things—and yanked a cord on the back of the wagon. His dad did the same on the far side, and the entire back end clanged to the ground forming a ramp.

  Not only had I missed the fact our tow had a tailgate, the Eastons stowed way more in there than I had thought. A parade of tires, tools, and portable torches spilled out with the men and women not on watch. Ten minutes later, I could hardly hear myself think as the shredded tires were cut away, axles bent straight, and repairs made to linkages underneath our ride.

  “Good thing they didn’t mess up my tractor tires.” Pete swigged from his water skin and patted Big Bertha’s rear tire. “They’re old and decrepit, but solid rubber. No way to cart spares along.”

  “I can’t believe you brought as much as you did.”

  “If there’s one thing we farmers know how to do besides grow things, it’s fix stuff. This lot wouldn’t be caught dead without the means to repair just about anything that could get broke.” Pete jerked a thumb at his family, slung the water skin over his shoulder, and got all serious on me. “Get us off the sand soon. This little shindig just sucked up all our spare tires. We can always patch a flat, but no more wholesale replacements.” His voice dropped to a whisper, and he eyed Manny and Dwain. “Do they know what they’re doing?”

  “I hope so,” I said and headed over to find out.

  11. Rearview Mirror

  T

  HANKS TO the Eastons’ ingenuity, the attack only cost us an hour, but the sun was clearly on the decline by the time we rolled on. Manny said the perturbations in the path forward came more frequently, which was evident by our numerous course corrections. Sometimes we’d only turn a fraction. Other times we’d come close to backtracking for no apparent reason.

  And of course, there was the ever-present sand. Unbroken vistas in every direction, heedless and uncaring of our convoluted path, our starts and stops, our turns and ultimate confusion. The baking sands would wait. Hours passed with no further hint of shamblers or any creatures at all. We rode alone through the dry sea, stopping occasionally to stretch, eat, and drink.

  “Damn it, nothing!” Quinn swept up the feather she’d dropped.

  Rather than zipping off toward base camp, it had simply fallen to her feet. My own seeking hadn’t done any better. Apparently, whatever blocked the radios and firespeak also messed with seeking spells.

  “At this rate we won’t make it out before dark.”

  The others were already climbing into the wagon or onto their rides. But it didn’t matter, we had nowhere to go. Manny and Dwain insisted they were adjusting as best they could, but both had clearly lost confidence.

  “We couldn’t even find our way back to the farm at this point,” she said. “I’m so turned around that I’m dizzy.”

  “Ralph could point the way again.” I mounted the four-wheeler and scooted forward so Quinn could swing her leg over.

  At the sound of his name, Ralph flashed teeth through lips coated in white powder, the remnants of three sugary cakes he’d eaten while watching our magic fail. A thought struck me as Manny pulled out.

  “Ralph, where’s base camp?” I kicked us into gear to follow the procession, but kept one eye on the small figure straddling my tank.

  Ralph bobbed his head and pointed at me—no, he pointed back along our track, opposite the setting sun.

  “That can’t be right,” Quinn said over my shoulder.

  “No it can’t.”

  Manny took us through two more turns over the next ten minutes. Ralph continued to point behind us, never varying by more than a few degrees. We’d made some extreme turns throughout the day, but always came back so the sun was properly oriented relative to our westward trek. Making a one-eighty turn would put the sun at our backs and have us heading back to…

  “Ralph, show me the farm like you did yesterday.”

  The little guy dropped his arm, flashed his mildly horrifying grin, and stood to point over my head.

  Laug
hter exploded in my ear along with a spray of spit. “Should’ve seen that coming,” Quinn said as she got herself under control.

  “I sort of did.” I wiped at my ear, decided to share, and smeared my wet fingers across her cheek, earning my abused eardrum a shriek.

  “Sure you did. Poor guy can only find the farm. That’s where Melissa caught him isn’t it? All he knows is the way home, and that’s exactly where we don’t want to go.”

  We crested a hill, spitting sand behind us and looking out across another vast expanse of dry wasteland. The sun tinged the distant dunes fiery gold with nubs of shadows just starting to stretch toward us.

  “Think about it. What would you do if you needed to go north but your defective compass only points south?”

  “Sounds like opposite day!” Quinn punched me in the side—I think harder than she meant—and I doubled over, nearly clunking heads with Ralph. “Sorry. We need to rein in Manny and figure out how to do this.”

  “Apology accepted.” Her hand felt warm and enticing as it slipped up under my shirt and those long fingers worked along my sore ribs.

  Manny glared daggers when I zoomed around front and cut him off. Yelling between vehicles wasn’t going to cut it. Pete and his dad joined us once we got the procession stopped. The others grabbed snacks and water while we worked out the details. I ended up having to ride in circles to demonstrate Ralph’s unerring ability to point back to the farmhouse. Dwain and Manny studied the imp and compared notes before concluding it just might work.

  We had a few false starts, mainly because Ralph wanted to point around me, which made it difficult to tell when I needed to come left or right. With Quinn’s help, we finally trained him to just point with his finger instead of throwing his arm out. He brimmed with excitement and had to be constantly reminded to calm down and just point.

  Of course Ralph’s jittery disposition could also be due to the mega-sized chocolate bar he ate just before we set off again. I’d often wondered where our imp stored his treats and the stone knife that appeared on demand. Now I had to question where his snacks came from—I hadn’t had that kind of candy and the Eastons didn’t do the whole sweets thing.

  Sometimes the changes in direction were subtle, other times not so much. Once I got the hang of turning away from where his finger slewed, we were able to keep our speed up. The technique was similar and just as disorienting as driving by looking in the rearview mirror. There was nothing to hit out here, but I could still flip us or the wagon over if I didn’t pay attention. When Ralph pointed at my left shoulder, I’d come right until his finger was again aimed at my sternum. If he strayed right, I came left. It became a game, and both of us grinned when the other had to make an adjustment.

  We made good time—or at least moved quickly. Progress was hard to judge in the open expanse. I kept fooling myself into thinking less sand swirled around us and we were about to scoot out from under the baking sun. But that was due more to the sun racing toward the horizon.

  “What’s up ahead?” Quinn asked as Ralph had me turn left.

  I spent more time staring down than looking where I was going. I glanced up and caught sight of a dark line shimmering on the horizon. Just a smear, but as we rode on it stretched before us like storm clouds cresting the distant dunes.

  “Weather maybe.” I put on more speed because Ralph was giving me the jockey signal, which meant no turns for a while. “It’ll be cold, but we can huddle in the harvester overnight. A storm is bad news.”

  It was a long way off, even at our current speed. Without warning, my navigator signaled wide, sending me on a dangerously sharp turn to the right. I looked back, worried the tractor couldn’t negotiate the tight maneuver. Pete did some fancy driving, downshifting so that his tires sank deep, and managed to turn the big rig on a dime as he called out for everyone to hang on tight. The right wagon wheels lifted off the ground a few inches as it pivoted and landed with a jarring whump.

  “They’re buildings!” Quinn slapped my shoulder and pointed ahead.

  With the last maneuver, the distant line I’d mistaken for clouds had jumped close. Squared-off apartment buildings towered over smaller structures forming the suburban skyline. The edges blurred and shifted as if on the far side of a thin waterfall. Distances could be deceptive, but what had been hours away moments before now couldn’t be more than a mile or two ahead.

  Shadows stretched across the ground reaching straight toward us, which seemed odd given the sun sat thirty degrees to our left. True shadows would slant off to the right, and these grew faster than reasonable given the slowly setting sun.

  “Something’s on the ground ahead.” I couldn’t spare more time to examine the phenomenon because Ralph fired off course changes like he was conducting an orchestra.

  We zigzagged right and left, until the imp again gave me the jockey signal. The buildings stood sharp and clear ahead, as did the swarm of brown-green scorpions boiling across the sand to intercept us. Magic surged behind me as Quinn readied a spell, but it dropped away almost instantly.

  “There’s no water out here!”

  Gunfire cracked from behind. The Eastons might be crack shots, but there was no way they could possibly pick off so many foot-long attackers. The little bastards would swarm over us faster than my fire could cook them.

  “Maybe we can hold them off with Spirit, build a mini hurricane like Anna did with the ghouls.” Even as I said it, I knew it wouldn’t be enough.

  We didn’t have the power between us that the young Bright had marshaled as she lashed out against her captors. Any winds we summoned would peter out long before we crossed the hundred yards of pinchers and stinger. I might be able to sweep them aside using Earth, but the paw tattoo on my shoulder flared painfully, warning me away from the thought. I’d acquired the mark as a result of my first major healing, and it did its best to keep me from making dangerous mistakes. Unleashing a blast of the very magic being used to invade our world was not a good idea.

  Ralph urged me forward with his finger aimed directly at my chest and bouncing on his oddly jointed legs as he stood in the saddle. I couldn’t just plow on. The little monsters would be hard pressed to get at Pete and his folks, but climbing the four-wheelers would only take seconds once we stopped…if we stopped.

  “Ed?” Quinn sounded panicked as I mashed down the throttle and we jerked forward.

  “Bug stomping time,” I called over my shoulder. “If we don’t stop, they can’t get us, right?”

  “Fuck yeah!” She planted a kiss on my cheek and laughed. “Go get ‘em, tiger.”

  Quinn waved frantically, encouraging the others to put the pedal to the metal, then clung tight as we plowed into the leading edge of the swarm. Our tires slipped on those hapless bugs, churning the first few dozen to bits. The ride grew bumpy as if we drove a rock-strewn creek bed. Dark ichor and shell fragments splashed up to coat our floor boards and legs. The scorpions shifted up ahead, piling three and four deep. It was like driving into mud. We slowed as the tires churned the wave into mush.

  Pain lanced through my right calf. I slapped away a fat scorpion, but others clung to the underside of the frame and worked their way up around the wheel well. The first to reach the front springs and scuttle up toward Ralph ended up skewered on the stone knife that appeared in the imp’s free hand. The second and third crumpled and flew back into the mass below as Quinn’s darts of Spirit energy picked them off. But we ran axle deep, and soon there would be too many to handle.

  I let off the accelerator, threw out my left arm, and called up Fire. The scorpions might not burn well, but they didn’t like the heat. The spell bought us a little breathing room as the swarm thinned back down to a manageable level, but I didn’t dare stop. Buildings loomed just a hundred yards ahead. Between my throbbing leg and the bitter cold spreading up my arm as the Fire took its toll, I knew the spell would be short lived.

  “Signal Pete to take lead,” I told Quinn. “Straight ahead. We’ll follow them out.”


  “Are you okay?” Her hands felt hot on my shoulders.

  “Just do it!”

  She waved the big tractor forward. Those massive wheels couldn’t care less about a few thousand bugs.

  “Straight ahead!” Quinn shouted. “Head for that apartment building. Make a path.”

  Pete gave a thumbs-up as the tractor’s engine roared like a t-rex and smoke billowed from his stacks. Farm equipment was designed to move down planted rows without destroying the crops, but the bugs weren’t lined up to avoid the tires and Pete slewed right and left as he drove, crushing a wide path for the ATVs. The music in my head sputtered out and the fire followed. Pain seared up my leg toward my groin, and my world narrowed to following the wagon.

  The jarring ride smoothed out, but my wheels slipped left and right in the gory paste. I leaned heavy on the handlebars, crowding poor Ralph to the point he climbed over to sit between me and Quinn. The sea of broken claws and smashed shells thinned, and I blinked down at a yellow line flickering beneath the ATV. The sucking grind of Pete’s tires turned to a hollow slapping. Sometime later he pulled to a stop, and I managed to swerve before plowing into the harvester.

  “What?” The air grew oppressive. Didn’t we have to get to the farmhouse?

  Hands pulled me from the saddle, and I found myself looking up into a beautiful face that seemed familiar. The angel smiled, then frowned. Then a stinging slap rocked my head to the side.

  “Get a grip, Ed.” Quinn looked angry. “I know you’re cold, but focus some more Fire magic on yourself. You’ve been poisoned—here and here.”

  There was numb pressure on my calf and knee where she touched. The last thing I wanted to do right now was magic—especially a Fire spell. A nap sounded so much better. My teeth chattered, which seemed at odds with the burning heat searing up my leg and spreading into my gut. But Quinn had that “don’t you dare argue with me” set to her jaw.